“The Scream” - Edvard Munch - (1893)
My feet grow heavier with every dreaded step that I take down that rickety old promenade.
A couple are walking in the distance and I spot they are synchronised in perfect unison as if they are being powered by clockwork.
Nothing about this place feels the way it does in the daytime, as children dart up and down in sunhats and shorts while their parents are lumbered with buckets and spades, grease soaked bags of donuts and billowing clouds of pink candyfloss on sticks. As the sun sets you begin to imagine what this place once looked like many years before now as Victorian people dressed in frocks, bonnets, top hats and breaches enjoyed the beauty of the beach in the same way we do today. The wind whistles through my ears like tinnitus and pulls me out of my daydream, the two clockwork people are drawing nearer and it is at this point I grind to a painful halt. It has been so violently gusty, I find myself temporarily blinded by what must be sand, scratching at my corneas. I instinctively close my eyes, trapping the sand under my eyelids and outstretch my arms as a guide. There is a public toilet a few yards away so I aim to get there as quickly as possible to wash my eyes out in the sink there.
All of a sudden, my eyes miraculously stopped stinging so I opened them and blinked a few times.
Life stood still. The sea paused, the passers by froze and as my eyes pivoted to the centre of my vision, a foreboding figure draped in a dusty black cloak and tatty hood stood silently.
Without warning, the hood slid backwards revealing a ghastly, slimy disfigured face with only holes for nostrils. I shuddered as it boar a hole right through my soul as if it knew all of my secrets. Slowly, it raised it’s flipper like hands up, clutched it’s face and let out a mighty wail which physically rattled my eardrums and instinctively I cowered to the ground, shielding my ears and head until the scream rung no more.
Hesitantly, I rose from my crumpled state and the shadowy figure had vanished. The sea was gently splashing against the rocks and the sky was now a pleasant lilac and pink, the sun peeking over the horizon.
I felt the gentle warmth of it and an ultimate calm washed over me, I knew that what I had just experienced must have been nothing more than all the stresses of my life mangling together and resulting in a nasty panic attack.
Fumbling for a couple of seconds for some small change, I approached the paper shop at the end of the prom, ready to treat myself to a much needed chocolate bar.
The meshed news stand outside the shop read: “LOCAL YOUNG COUPLE MISSING” with a photograph which churned my stomach and made my blood run cold.
I’d just seen them.
Welcome to my new blog where I write short stories and poems based on art!^
